New Combat Animations in Patch 7.3 Blog -- It's Magic!

Blizzard has released a blog detailing some of their changes to the Caster Animations in Patch 7.3. This blog also includes comments from designers, animators and sound artists.We've covered the changes to the following animations in Patch 7.3:

Blizzard

With patch 7.3 on the horizon, we thought it was time to share some updates to combat animations for several casting classes. Similar to what we did with the melee classes at the launch of Legion, these updates are all about priests, mages, Restoration and Elemental shaman, and some additional refinements to Restoration druid casting animations! We’re also continuing to work on even more enhancements for additional classes at a later point in development.A little over two years ago, we set our sights on revamping combat animations. The team has wanted to renovate it somehow, but what exactly does that mean? To determine the answer, our development leadership put together a small group of people to come up with a prototype of what we thought could use some cleaning up. You are currently experiencing the fruits of this work with the new melee animations. Our final goal was to create new melee moves that would make the game feel better, but not change how the game was played. During this prototype phase, we also came up with a plan for casters, but didn’t have time to put it into production until now. Let’s dig into some of the things we did. WoW has grown a lot over the last decade, and after we took stock of our combat pacing, it was clear that we needed to deliver a much tighter and more responsive experience for every button you press. Back in the days of simply chain-casting Frostbolt, it didn’t really matter how much time it took your character to go from precast to missile launch. Today, you have a suite of spells at your fingertips where cast times have sped up and split-second decision making is key. To help the way the game is currently played, we wanted more timing consistency.Keeping this split-second decision making in mind for the new cast animations, we found a sweet spot between game play responsiveness and striking, weighty animation. The punchiness of our new animations were working so well, we decided to revisit our original cast animations with a fresh eye on what we had learned—while keeping the style and uniqueness of the classic cast animations for every race. The only thing we touched was the time it took to hit the cast pose since, in the live game, each race’s cast timing is different. This ensured that every spell cast with our new class animations or our iconic racial animations had the same punchy and responsive feel.Ultimately, our main goals remained the same for our next chapter in updating combat; retain the individuality and identity of what came before, pay off epic moments over the course of a battle, and update the game as seamlessly as possible. If we did our jobs right, it should feel as though it has always been this way. Our work should blend into the background so you can focus on melting, smashing, cursing, crushing, igniting, stabbing, purifying, and exploding your foes into unfathomably tiny bits. Adam Kugler, Lead Class Designer With animation, the first things you might notice are all new caster ready idles. Currently, after you cast a spell, the character goes back to their stand animation. For this revamp, we wanted to create distinct idles that conveyed the personality of the caster much like how a melee class does while holding two swords or a giant, two-handed axe. This was tricky since class fantasy is very personal and no two people have the same idea on how a mage or shaman should stand. We also looked at what we could do with spells that had a cast time. Currently, directed and omni (area of effect) spells loop as the spell builds up before firing. These are distinct animations we had no intention of removing, but to fit the idea of a spell building up, we thought a strong, progressive motion showing the character pulling magic from the ground or gathering it from the air would look cool. So that’s what we did with the new precast animations. Again, class fantasy was a factor with this—how exactly does a shaman pull magic from the ground? We also created a bunch of quick, single-handed animations to add variety to instant spells. These look especially neat as you run around casting with your right and left hands. Beefier spells now have stronger straight arm moves, while curses fire with a flick of the wrist. Kevin Rucker, Senior Animator The next step for revamped animations was revamped spell effects to go along with them! This was a tricky undertaking, especially for iconic spells. The goal was to pay homage to the original—but in some cases, we needed to completely reimagine the spell. It gave us a chance to define what each kit of magic should look like and with higher fidelity than what was possible in classic WoW. With that in mind, we aimed to work our way towards snappier, more modern spell effects without trampling too much on sacred ground. Overall, we needed the combat for casters to look and feel more exciting and rewarding while keeping a unique visual identity for each class and spec.For example, with the Blizzard spell, we kept all the same elements of the original, but brought them in line with more modern effects. We also defined what makes this frost mage-like (wispy, magical, precise) as opposed to shaman frost (naturalist, elemental, realistic) or death knight frost (bitter, aggressive, sinister). This is a good example of an homage spell, where we wanted to keep the intention of the original spell. With Arcane Missiles, on the other hand, we reimagined what it could look like. We kept the iconic structure of five bursts of four missiles, but got creative with the rest. What should a mage’s Arcane magic look like? Chaotic firecracker-like sparkle explosions? We think so! The effects revamp effort was all about the balance between paying homage to the original feel and reimagining everything. How do we breathe new life into each spec, but make sure we retain the core identity? How do we build a tighter, more cohesive class fantasy around spells players have been casting for 12+ years? How do we make sure all these fancy new effects don’t tank your graphical performance? It has been a long, careful balancing act between what we, as artists, want it to look like and what you, as players, want it to feel like. We’re psyched about how it turned out and we hope you’re equally psyched to run around casting your improved spells! Sarah Carmody, FX Artist We hope you enjoyed this behind-the-scenes look at the new caster visual updates. We had lots of fun creating all these animations and effects and look forward to hearing your thoughts on them.

Comment by Windusk

Comment by Azyri

Comment by Keydiam

My only problem with these animations is that every race now uses the same. You are no longer a for example blood elf mage, no first and foremost your are a mage.

Comment by xEvilMuffin

on 2017-08-16T12:41:10-05:00

will warlocks share these animations ?

Comment by SilverDragon234

on 2017-08-16T12:42:59-05:00

My only problem with these animations is that every race now uses the same. You are no longer a for example blood elf mage, no first and foremost your are a mage.

'Tis what happens if you use magic.

Comment by Eldoug

on 2017-08-16T12:47:15-05:00

Warlocks will have the original animations for the time being. I don't remember where I read this, but there was a blue post saying new Warlock animations should be ready by 7.3.5.

Comment by xEvilMuffin

on 2017-08-16T12:48:05-05:00

Warlocks will have the original animations for the time being. I don't remember where I read this, but there was a blue post saying new Warlock animations should be ready by 7.3.5.

feelsbadman

Comment by joaorodolpho

on 2017-08-16T12:51:49-05:00

Warlocks will have the original animations for the time being. I don't remember where I read this, but there was a blue post saying new Warlock animations should be ready by 7.3.5.

Blue post say "in the future".... can 7.3.5.... 7.4.... or next expasion.

Beside, midle-patch is just Balancement / adjustment. no new content, aways.

Comment by SquirePip

on 2017-08-16T12:53:46-05:00

Casters still don't use their weapons though :(. I'd really like casting animations where spellcasters used their weapons to focus and unleash their power. Might be just me but a spell blasting from the end of a staff looks cooler than shooting out of a hand IMO.

Comment by Deployed

on 2017-08-16T12:55:51-05:00

My only problem with these animations is that every race now uses the same. You are no longer a for example blood elf mage, no first and foremost your are a mage.

I saw similar comments about melee classes at launch, and I will make the same observation now that I did back then. The race specific animations are still there, the only real difference is that they are not the only animation now. You have the racial animation mixed in with the class animations. A Gnome casting Fireball will not look like a Orc casting Fireball, even though they will both look the same when casting Blizzard.

That said, I will say that will I agree that idle animations are long overdue, I would've preferred consistency with melee animations in that they are unique to the race, not the class.

Comment by mathiaslindberg

on 2017-08-16T12:58:05-05:00

It's cool that they're updating the animations, but there's still a lot of old spell effects from vanilla that need updating, some are 2D with minimal animation (Power Word: Shield)

Comment by Hawkthedain

on 2017-08-16T12:58:50-05:00

Warlocks will have the original animations for the time being. I don't remember where I read this, but there was a blue post saying new Warlock animations should be ready by 7.3.5.

Blue post say "in the future".... can 7.3.5.... 7.4.... or next expasion.

Beside, midle-patch is just Balancement / adjustment. no new content, aways.

What ? 7.1.5 and 7.2.5 bringed a lot of content, what are you talking about ?

Comment by Tombsv

on 2017-08-16T13:32:39-05:00

Are they using really low graphic settings in those videos?

Comment by Adamovix

on 2017-08-16T13:33:32-05:00

I'm glad this game evolves more than just new models. It's very refreshing to see changes in core things like that, it really makes playing feel more entertaining and interesting.

Comment by voreo

on 2017-08-16T13:39:40-05:00

Still hoping Worgen are getting love with the next expansion.

Comment by SovietOtter

on 2017-08-16T13:48:40-05:00

My only problem with these animations is that every race now uses the same. You are no longer a for example blood elf mage, no first and foremost your are a mage.

Most of the classes still use the default race animations for filler skills, yo.

Comment by slavedheart

on 2017-08-16T13:55:46-05:00

Casters still don't use their weapons though :(. I'd really like casting animations where spellcasters used their weapons to focus and unleash their power. Might be just me but a spell blasting from the end of a staff looks cooler than shooting out of a hand IMO.

This, this, 1000% this! Though I'm not completely sure about every spell... Perhaps only big ones, or only a couple per spec. Arcane missiles from the hand, but arcane explosion by "slamming" their staff into the ground (straight up, like planting a flag) and maybe barrage by swinging it in front of them, or in an overhead arc, like swinging a hammer? SPriest using his dagger and book to channel, or sweeping it melee style for SWD? As a matter of fact, it seems that some simple variety could be added by borrowing a few animations from our melee brothers and sisters. In return, they could borrow a few of our empty hand animations for abilities that don't need to have a weapon in their grip.

It just seems fair, especially considering hunters use their weapon for "casting" all the time.... hey wait! Yeah, hunters need a few new ones as well, as I'd love to see my MM cast crows by overhand lobbing an actual crow at the target, or aimed shot by holding his bow vertically, but arcane shot going all west coast gangster, bow horizontal....

I've got a million of 'em blizz, just look me up! (Or perhaps find me groveling outside your offices begging to do the lowest job on the totem pole? Lol)

Comment by Kalameda

Comment by kellorion

on 2017-08-16T14:38:14-05:00

Casters still don't use their weapons though :(. I'd really like casting animations where spellcasters used their weapons to focus and unleash their power. Might be just me but a spell blasting from the end of a staff looks cooler than shooting out of a hand IMO.

This, this, 1000% this! Though I'm not completely sure about every spell... Perhaps only big ones, or only a couple per spec. Arcane missiles from the hand, but arcane explosion by "slamming" their staff into the ground (straight up, like planting a flag) and maybe barrage by swinging it in front of them, or in an overhead arc, like swinging a hammer? SPriest using his dagger and book to channel, or sweeping it melee style for SWD? As a matter of fact, it seems that some simple variety could be added by borrowing a few animations from our melee brothers and sisters. In return, they could borrow a few of our empty hand animations for abilities that don't need to have a weapon in their grip.

It just seems fair, especially considering hunters use their weapon for "casting" all the time.... hey wait! Yeah, hunters need a few new ones as well, as I'd love to see my MM cast crows by overhand lobbing an actual crow at the target, or aimed shot by holding his bow vertically, but arcane shot going all west coast gangster, bow horizontal....

I've got a million of 'em blizz, just look me up! (Or perhaps find me groveling outside your offices begging to do the lowest job on the totem pole? Lol)

+10000 QFT

Comment by Megoover

on 2017-08-16T15:03:50-05:00

Atleast they are still not deleted warlocks from game. And its surprising